I’ve been doing the acupuncture thing for about six weeks now with very little effect on my Crohn’s. However, two weeks ago my practitioner suggested I eliminate wheat from my diet. I agreed to try it, but she probably saw my eyes rolling. No bread? No cookies, donuts, twizzlers (that’s right twizzlers are full of wheat) and NO PRETZELS. If consuming wheat products actually is causing my gut problems, the fact that I was eating a half bag of pretzels every night might have been an issue.

But I’ve been avoiding wheat now for a couple of weeks and there was an almost immediate improvement in my condition. Plus the couple of times I fell off the wagon I noticed things got worse. I’m still having some problems, but I’m hoping over time things will continue to improve. I’ve also resumed taking turmeric and probiotics. Time will tell.

I did some research and found this article on the National Institute of Health website, it’s an overview of research on the inflammatory effects of grain and wheat consumptions. It’s a little difficult to wade through but has some eye opening information. And of course there’s Dr. William Davis and the “Wheat Belly Blog.”

There’s a lot of conflicting info out there of course. Katherine’s advice was to give up wheat, not gluten. She said barley, which contains gluten is probably OK. Some of the info I found recommends dropping of all kinds of grains, including corn. I’ve replaced pretzels with corn chips (I must have my salty snacks) and hamburgers with tacos without problems.